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Abstract

this story of my wig toss — Yeah, my wig landed on an unsuspecting audience member and I was bawling like a baby while running offstage…, and how startled and baffled (beyond belief?) the dancers looked who were left with their feet half dangling, in midair between kicks, and then the shocked looks on the faces of the thousand people in the audience .I mean this shit is a great story!! You can’t make this stuff up. Truth is greater than fiction??Weirdly I have almost zero memory of what happened that night after I tossed my wig off my head. What I did AFTER this point still remains a mystery in my brain.I do vaguely recall the next day though, after the producers fired me.I was cleaning out my dressing room drawers. I was packing up all my makeup fast, throwing it all haphazardly into a big brown bag. I was not worried a bit about organization. I had done this many other times at gigs where I felt panicked and needed to bail — QUICKLY!I was just sooo used to running.After throwing my wigs and costumes and jewelry and makeup and whatever else was around my dressing room into random bags and suitcases I recall feeling total freedom and then exuberant joy as I fled the theater for the last time.Ahhhh….I ran outside and looked straight up at the serene African night sky, into the dark moonlight. I felt a calm cool satisfying breeze on my face —so glad to be freeeee!!The next memory I have was the following night. I went to see the Beyond Belief show for the first time and watched it as an audience member would. I was sitting in the audience where I slid down into a cushiony red velvet booth in the back, inconspicously watching my replacement, a Liza Minnelli impersonator belting out NewYork NewYork and Cabaret. I noticed the same dancers that danced with me. They quickly and miraculously learned a new set of songs for her in a short period of time. I bet they were pissed off that they had to have the pressure of learning new material. How dare that Sreisand girl just bail like that? How COULD I bail? I don’t know…I just knew I HAD TO LEAVE.My heart felt huge relief though , just sitting there unnoticed, quiet and anonymous in the dark watching the show. No more pressure on me. Yay!! — but — also I felt overwhelming embarrassment and deep shame to have done what I did.The next memory I have is being on a train with Rick — Both of us were stoned out of our minds on marijuana brownies and ecstasy. We were singing silly songs and laughing in our tiny train cabin. watching the African landscape slide by out the window.It was an eerily silent

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train car with only the WHOOSH WHOOSH sounds of the train sliding through the African bush out of Sun City — towards Cape Town.Our new peaceful life in Cape Town?<figure id="85de"><img src="https://cdn-images-1.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:800/0*Khca6YwE_0L89HVW"><figcaption>Photo by <a href="https://unsplash.com/@derekstory?utm_source=medium&utm_medium=referral">Derek Story</a> on <a href="https://unsplash.com?utm_source=medium&utm_medium=referral">Unsplash</a></figcaption></figure>Rick was singing me one of our old favorite songs, that he used to sing me when we were dating and in love— even using my nickname that he used to use lovingly — For those few drug crazed moments on that train the two of us connected somehow like we did when we weremad for eachotther just a few short months ago. When we felt carefree and silly, full of zest for each other and life.For some reason neither of us was facing the reality of it all though. The reality that we had just spent 7 months in an abusive dangerous relationship. That he almost killed me. He did kill me. He killed my spirit — but neither of us wanted to go down that path. That path of… what the heck just happened? We were both too stoned on marijuana brownies, staring out the train window at the tiny colorful shack houses with colorful laundry swaying on the lines.. all zooming by us…Looking at the various groups of young boys and teenaged black kids playing together and riding around on rickety old bikes<figure id="3714"><img src="https://cdn-images-1.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:800/0*Eom5ngM3OKXZMrFY"><figcaption>Photo by <a href="https://unsplash.com/@jack_anstey?utm_source=medium&utm_medium=referral">Jack Anstey</a> on <a href="https://unsplash.com?utm_source=medium&utm_medium=referral">Unsplash</a></figcaption></figure>The last 7 months at this gig felt like an odd dream. A figment of my imagination, a big blur, — -just like it is today.Very very blurry. I am still in a blur from it all.But the most important thing to me — the very very good news in all of it was that I KNEW I had my $78,420 saved in the bank account in Cape Town waiting for me !!I would soon be able to have it!!That thought made me smile.(The irony is that in the next chapter I go to the bank and all my money is GONE from our joint account. Rick got more violent after this time. We rented a room togehter with an old man Trevor Hook but Rick began choking and hitting me even more violently so I decided I had to leave him. I stayed with various friends and acquaintences after this. I had no money to get home to the States but this is really only a beginning of the story…)</article></body>

Stoned On The Train

A final chapter from upcoming memoir

This excerpt is from one of the final chapters of my memoir .

CHAPTER 19:

I DON’T REMEMBER the details of my last night of the Beyond Belief show when I threw my wig off my head suddenly — while I was on stage singing. I really don’t recall what happened after that or even any details of it.

It’s like I have amnesia and have had amnesia for over 22 years since this all happened.

All I know is that I did it. It happened, and it was the end of the line. The end of the pain. The end of the suffering. The end of tolerating this show for all those months. The end of the abusive husband back stage — The end, but also it felt like a new beginning.

Maybe I didn’t want to remember it all . Maybe I blocked it completely out of my memory all these years because the whole thing was too damn awful, and I wanted to banish it from my brain. Exile it forever — and NOT remember.

But, on the other hand I DID want to remember — because it seems to be the one story I always tell people when they ask about my show business days or when I explain my life as an impersonator. It always culminates with me telling them this ‘wig toss’ story because that’s the one memory that is most vivid. The one memory I recall most about this time in my life.

The joke is, I “flipped my wig literally and figuratively” which seems to always get a chuckle.

It is odd how that whole period of my life (which to me was life threatening and dark) could come down to — someone chuckling at that line.

“OH haha. YOu flipped your wig. I bet that was ‘something else!”

or

“HAHA. So you ran off the stage and don’t remember what happened after that?”

WOW. That sounds crazy..”

Yea yea.. OK. It IS funny. IT DOES seem crazy but it also feels like somehow or maybe I am not taken seriously. Like it’s now a big joke and punchline.

It seems that it is all being minimized. It also feels wrong to equate an entire traumatic life threatening experience with one silly joke and a punchline.

Today it just feels urgent to tell this story of my wig toss — Yeah, my wig landed on an unsuspecting audience member and I was bawling like a baby while running offstage…, and how startled and baffled (beyond belief?) the dancers looked who were left with their feet half dangling, in midair between kicks, and then the shocked looks on the faces of the thousand people in the audience .

I mean this shit is a great story!! You can’t make this stuff up. Truth is greater than fiction??

Weirdly I have almost zero memory of what happened that night after I tossed my wig off my head. What I did AFTER this point still remains a mystery in my brain.

I do vaguely recall the next day though, after the producers fired me.

I was cleaning out my dressing room drawers. I was packing up all my makeup fast, throwing it all haphazardly into a big brown bag. I was not worried a bit about organization. I had done this many other times at gigs where I felt panicked and needed to bail — QUICKLY!

I was just sooo used to running.

After throwing my wigs and costumes and jewelry and makeup and whatever else was around my dressing room into random bags and suitcases I recall feeling total freedom and then exuberant joy as I fled the theater for the last time.

Ahhhh….

I ran outside and looked straight up at the serene African night sky, into the dark moonlight. I felt a calm cool satisfying breeze on my face —so glad to be freeeee!!

The next memory I have was the following night. I went to see the Beyond Belief show for the first time and watched it as an audience member would. I was sitting in the audience where I slid down into a cushiony red velvet booth in the back, inconspicously watching my replacement, a Liza Minnelli impersonator belting out NewYork NewYork and Cabaret. I noticed the same dancers that danced with me. They quickly and miraculously learned a new set of songs for her in a short period of time. I bet they were pissed off that they had to have the pressure of learning new material. How dare that Sreisand girl just bail like that? How COULD I bail? I don’t know…I just knew I HAD TO LEAVE.

My heart felt huge relief though , just sitting there unnoticed, quiet and anonymous in the dark watching the show. No more pressure on me. Yay!! — but — also I felt overwhelming embarrassment and deep shame to have done what I did.

The next memory I have is being on a train with Rick — Both of us were stoned out of our minds on marijuana brownies and ecstasy. We were singing silly songs and laughing in our tiny train cabin. watching the African landscape slide by out the window.

It was an eerily silent train car with only the WHOOSH WHOOSH sounds of the train sliding through the African bush out of Sun City — towards Cape Town.

Our new peaceful life in Cape Town?

Rick was singing me one of our old favorite songs, that he used to sing me when we were dating and in love— even using my nickname that he used to use lovingly — For those few drug crazed moments on that train the two of us connected somehow like we did when we weremad for eachotther just a few short months ago. When we felt carefree and silly, full of zest for each other and life.

For some reason neither of us was facing the reality of it all though. The reality that we had just spent 7 months in an abusive dangerous relationship. That he almost killed me. He did kill me. He killed my spirit — but neither of us wanted to go down that path. That path of… what the heck just happened? We were both too stoned on marijuana brownies, staring out the train window at the tiny colorful shack houses with colorful laundry swaying on the lines.. all zooming by us…Looking at the various groups of young boys and teenaged black kids playing together and riding around on rickety old bikes

The last 7 months at this gig felt like an odd dream. A figment of my imagination, a big blur, — -just like it is today.

Very very blurry. I am still in a blur from it all.

But the most important thing to me — the very very good news in all of it was that I KNEW I had my $78,420 saved in the bank account in Cape Town waiting for me !!

I would soon be able to have it!!

That thought made me smile.

(The irony is that in the next chapter I go to the bank and all my money is GONE from our joint account. Rick got more violent after this time. We rented a room togehter with an old man Trevor Hook but Rick began choking and hitting me even more violently so I decided I had to leave him. I stayed with various friends and acquaintences after this. I had no money to get home to the States but this is really only a beginning of the story…)